The Second Bird Quilt

 

In my bird quilts I like to arrange the birds as if they are talking to each other. As if they are discovering things they have in common. I try to make about the same number of right facing birds as I do left facing birds.

But I couldn't control how many birds I got from students and customers. The vast majority of them face left. And I never expected the degree of customization I received. So I wanted to spread the "unique" birds around.

Now before you all think this is totally beyond you, and that birds HAVE to be unique, and different sizes, etc., check out the quilt that Joan made, below:

Joan made 34 birds almost exactly alike. She wasn't interested in fussy cutting wings. She just used the fabrics she had on hand. Aside from the squirrel at the upper right, there isn't anything unusual about this quilt.

Except the arrangement, while seemingly staid and boring, is really quite lovely. This arrangement sets up a very nice rhythm, and the resulting negative spaces around the birds really sings. 

I find it so interesting, I would never have had an odd number of birds in one row, because I would have thought it wasn't "balanced." Well, it just goes to show you I know NOTHING! These birds don't have fancy fussy cut wings. Yet this quilt doesn't suffer AT ALL! This is a very beautiful quilt, and anybody who can make a bird (and that means you), can likewise use this arrangement and produce a very beautiful quilt. I look at Joan's quilt and I think that sometimes in my quest for something (I don't know what...) I am looking in the wrong place. 

This quilt is a perfect example of "I am pretty sure the idea would be boring, so I'm not even going to try it... but I would be WRONG." In other words, it is very easy for ALL OF US to overthink things.

This may be the final layout of the Second Bird Quilt, but I am not sure. I added a right facing bird of my own and that might make me happy. We shall see.

But I think in the future I might make a bird quilt and use Joan's arrangement idea (except I'll leave out the squirrel.)

You too, can make birds. They are lots of fun, and kind of addictive. Joan (the same Joan above) said she bought the tutorial and decided to try one out so see how it would go together. Next thing she knew she had made 34... You can get my tutorial for making birds here, at my Etsy shop. It's an instant download so you can get started right away.